


I keep my hands, 'Til you come into the water

by IspeakfortheQueen



Category: The Dark Crystal (1982), The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance (TV)
Genre: Book Verse, Dream Fasting, F/F, Lesbian pining, Onica POV, POV Second Person, Sharing a Body, Touch-Starved, except make it angsty, just you me and the unconscious body of the pirate queen's first mate between us, tfw ur gf is a spider commandeering ur bff's body
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-05
Updated: 2020-06-05
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:15:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,970
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24547501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IspeakfortheQueen/pseuds/IspeakfortheQueen
Summary: Tae's fingers pass across your cheek the way Tavra would brush away your hair before kissing you.  Then Tae's body sighs, stands, and walks over to the remains of the fire to sleep.  (Set during Flames of the Dark Crystal by J.M. Lee)
Relationships: Onica/Tavra (Dark Crystal)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 8





	I keep my hands, 'Til you come into the water

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "Come to the Water" by Mitski but I listened almost exclusively to Hayley Henderickx while writing this. Set during Flames of the Dark Crystal by J.M. Lee when spider!Tavra is commanding Tae's body. This one is dedicated to all the queers still quarantined away from their SOs while the world is set alight with resistance.

You wake from your dreams of fire and smoke to the shifting orange sunlight through your eye lids. There is a warm body pressed to your front and breathing so faint and slow it blends into the river sounds around you. Everyone else is still asleep.

The sunlight reflects off the red-gold strands of Tae’s hair. Her body is still like a dead thing, but the tips of your fingers can feel the blood flowing through her. You had fallen asleep with this body in your arms. 

Tavra had tried holding you the night before on the raft. Nothing too daring out of respect for Tae, just the simple act of wrapping of her arms around you. 

“Does it feel the same or does it just feel like Tae?” she had whispered. You had to admit it was strange. Tae’s smell and body wrapped around you with the same posture and tense muscles of Tavra. It was not the same, but you had let her hold you because she needed to. When she wept quietly into your hair you kept your arms wrapped around her.

Now it’s just Tae again. You reach out a hand to sweep away golden hair from her neck and look for Tavra but all you find is the welt of a gentle spider bite.

The first brother is sending his rays through the trees, making all the water in the river look slick and black as burnt nebrie oil. A sparkle of blue catches your eye at the front of the raft and you pick your way through your sleeping friends to where you can see urSan’s lithe arms and head dip in and out of the water.

“Good morning! Did you sleep well?” the little blue spider asks.

“I dream of nothing but fire,” you say, sitting beside Tavra. She climbs up your arm and settles on your shoulder.

Tavra had joked, before, long ago on the boat, under the protection of warm quilts and incense, how she wanted to get tangled forever in your hair. Now it seems dangerously too easy.

“And you? Did you sleep well?” You know Tavra will not answer that, but she will appreciate the politeness of the sentiment. You can hear her give a low hum of acknowledgement in responses before standing to stretch her body towards the river ahead.

“urSan says it is another day’s swim before we arrive at the valley.”

\- - -

It is true that you dream of nothing but fire these days. Triumphant blue hearth fire, comforting orange cook fire, red fire of horrors you cannot quite make out. Sometimes the dreams provide so much smoke that it is hard to see which path will take them to which fire. 

You wake up to the sounds of the night. Insects singing their eternal night songs, crawlies creeping along on the underbrush hunt. It is not the familiar lap of waves on a boat, nor the familiar rustle of wind in the sails, and you must remind yourself once more just how far from home you are. The earth you lay on is soft and with a texture like velvet. It smells green and damp and not at all like the salt and coarse grit of sand. 

You sit up and let the moonlight above filter through the trees of the Dark Woods. Your eyes adjust to the light and soon you can discern what was once the campfire from the few orange embers that are scattered like stars on the ash. Beyond the fire, facing the forest, sits Tavra.

She took watch duty first. She would have taken it all night if you had not woken up. It is good that you did. Tavra would be tired when you two need all your faculties at your disposal, especially if there’s trouble in Stone-in-the-Wood.

You creep behind the soldier, watching as Tavra flicks back Tae’s ears.

“You can go back to sleep if you like,” she says, turning back so you can see the green of Tae’s eyes. “You need your rest too, my love.” You say it in that soft but firm voice she knows to listen to. She huffs in protest anyway.

“This body is always resting!”

“Tae’s mind is resting. You need to take care of her body while she’s away. It won’t do any good to get to Cera-Na and have her completely broken down.” You look past Tae’s tangle of golden hair to the little blue spider. You make it known that you are looking at her and not Tae, and say, “Your little body needs rest too.”

Tae's fingers pass across your cheek the way Tavra would brush away your hair before kissing you. Then Tae's body sighs, stands, and walks over to the remains of the fire to sleep.

\- - -

After trudging though the abandoned fragments of Stone-in-Wood, witnessing blue and rainbow colored light emanate from the entrance to the Caves of Grot, and getting run out of a meadow by a darkened landstrider, the two of you determine that the best place to go is home. You pass over the mountains, sneak past Har’ar, and find your old faithful boat waiting patiently tied up at the wharf. 

The boat is a mess after the incident with skekSa. Getting sucked into and spit out from a giant snapper’s mouth before being abandoned for weeks will do that to a boat. Still it is home, and what a comfort it is to light the cook fire and smell the incense. To feel the familiar sharp tug of rope in your hand and unfurl the sails. Tavra laments that two out of your three missions were failures. The sails catch the wind and it pushes you forward. You remark that the two of you were simply meant to be on a different path than the ones anticipated. Tavra concedes that that is the truth for so many things.

\- - -

There is something about the return to the salt smell of the ocean that will awaken the soul of any Sifa who has been away from home for too long.

It is like Tae knows to wait until her body is safely out at sea to come back to them. Tavra finishes securing the last of the rope and is heading towards the cabin when she lets out a gasp and paws at her neck. You realize it is time and you go over to help your friend return to the waking world.

When you’ve got your arms securely around her, Tavra leaps off Tae’s neck and onto your arm.

Tae’s breathing becomes less and less shallow as she wrestles her mind to wakefulness. You take her inside the cabin and set her on the cushions and quilts. You grab a handful of herbs off the ceiling and press them to her nose. Her eyes open and she looks around.

“Onica! Where-”

“You are okay. You’re here.”

“skekSa! She-“

“It’s all over. You’re on my boat, skekSa is gone. Stay with me, Tae.”

Her green eyes look wildly around the cabin, finally settling on one of the cracked lanterns that is barely hanging from the ceiling. She inhales and her body relaxes. 

“I had the strangest dream.”

“I’m sure you did, no don’t get up. Rest.”

You brew her some tá. In time you tell her of everything that’s happened. She will be fine. When you get to the Omerya she can see a proper healer. In the meantime all the three of you can do is rest. The three of you will be in Cera-Na by daybreak. 

\- - - 

You wake up in the familiar swing of your hammock. There is the sound of soft whispering. You open an eye to peer out into the cabin. There is Tae, sitting up and speaking into the cupped palms of her hands.

You let them have their talk before getting up as quietly as you can. Tae notices of course.

“Your far-dream came true,” she says. Her hands are still cupped but she is looking right at you in the dark. The moon and the sun. “I thought that when it didn’t happen as you first read it, it meant that you were the sun. Now I can see that it was right the whole time.”

“I was young then,” you say cooly, stoking the cook fire to see better. “If I had the same dream now there wouldn’t be as much confusion.” It's a lie. If anything the dreams have become more confusing.

“That one time aside, you are still one of the best Far-Dreamers. There is a reason why our Maudra wants you in her court. You should join us.”

You pause for a moment in looking at the flames before looking back up at your friend. “No matter how I look, I cannot see myself on the Omerya for long. I’m meant to be somewhere else.” Many of the paths of flames in your dreams have lead to a smooth rock wall that creeps out of the ground. The paths leading to this place have been increasing in the most recent nights. Whatever that wall is, or whether it is a symbol for something, _that _is your destiny, even with no way to tell what this wall means.__

__There is a long smooth silence where you steady your ears on the sound of the water against the hull._ _

__“Tavra and I were talking. About- what happened. While I was away.”_ _

__You look back up at Tae. She has that conspiratorial glint in her eyes. The one that agreed to sail with you into a storm all those trine ago._ _

__“I want to thank you both,” she says, “For taking care of my body. Tavra and I agreed on an appropriate gift.” You see what she is about to do in an instant before she does it. Part of you thinks she can’t be serious, but another part of you sits back calmly as you watch her lift her hand to her neck and whisper, “Go ahead, Silverling.”_ _

__The glint of Tae’s eyes disappears into the glint of Tavra’s eyes. She leans across the fire so that her freckled face is close to yours. She will ask you for a dream fast and you will accept._ _

__Her hands stretch nervously to yours. “Can I-“_ _

__“Of course.”_ _

__Then there is the soft touch of her mouth to yours and the clasp of your fingers and you enter the dream space. She is kissing you there too. Her hair is its natural silver and soft purples and her stature and body all her own. She wraps her own arms around you and you hold her just as tight. The old warm and familiar press of two souls together. You can’t say what you want to say out loud, can’t find the words for the relief and love filling you out and you don’t know if it’s her or you feeling it and pouring it into the other but that doesn’t matter. Both of you feel what you want to say to each other._ _

__Then the kiss ends. Tae removes her hand and her face. It had only been a soft short moment. You should be sad that it’s over so soon, but you’re only filled with that deep warmth you felt in the dream fast, like someone has wrapped your heart in loving careful hands and that alone will sustain you for trine upon trine._ _

__You lean back on the cushions and nod a curt thanks to your friend. “What a thoughtful gift, Tae.”_ _

__Tae leans back easily on her side of the fire, humming thoughtfully through the flames. The blue spider skitters across the floor and into the lap of your skirts. Tavra climbs up your arm and onto your shoulder to hide in your hair._ _


End file.
